Led by coach Greg Toal, Don Bosco a national power

RAMSEY – The Rev. John Talamo is responsible for making the call that has forever changed North Jersey high school football.

He was desperate to hire a head coach who could alter the image of his football program.

In doing months of research, Talamo sought input from players and their parents, students and teachers and yes, even the school's mailman.

The consensus answer to one question — Who is the best football coach in New Jersey? – ended up selling Talamo without a résumé crossing his desk.

So one March night nearly 13 years ago, the former principal of Don Bosco opened the phone book and began dialing a man he had never met.

Talamo was unaware Greg Toal was set to become Clifton's coach the following day.

"I told him that I was looking for a football coach and when I told him what school it was, he started laughing," recalled Talamo, now the pastor of Our Lady of the Lake parish in Louisiana. "I said, 'Well, hold on, Coach, give me a chance. Look, I understand the situation here' … and he said, 'Let me tell you about the situation there. I wouldn't take my kids on that field and risk getting them hurt because of the playing conditions there.' "

Undeterred, at the end of that 10-minute conversation, Talamo pressed Toal for a face-to-face meeting to continue their discussion about the possibility.

"He told me, 'To be honest Father, I'm supposed to sign with Clifton,' " added Talamo, whose reassignment by the Salesians led to his departure from Don Bosco in 2002. '[But] because you called me and because you're a priest, I'll give you that respect.'

"When we hung up the phone, I prayed things would work out for the best."

Talamo and Toal toured the Don Bosco campus the next night.

While Toal kicked rocks that littered the football field, providing a comprehensive list of everything he believed Don Bosco was not doing, Talamo spoke of having his football team as the crown jewel of an athletic and academic powerhouse.

Toal wanted to see from Don Bosco officials the same commitment he demanded from his players. Talamo promised loyalty in making some of the changes Toal believed were necessary for the Ironmen to take their program to another level.

Two hours of spirited back-and-forth later, Talamo registered the biggest victory of his Don Bosco tenure when Toal agreed to become the next head coach of the Ironmen.

The rebuilding began shortly thereafter when Talamo brought in a landscape architect to redesign Granatell Stadium – Don Bosco's home field – from the ground up.

"Father John really did convince me this was the challenge worth taking," said Toal, 58. "We hoped to be good and we were going to work hard … but we never really projected where we are now."

What Don Bosco has done to this point is more than either man imagined.

The Ironmen have reset the standard for gridiron success in the Northeast, becoming the first New Jersey team to finish No. 1 in USA Today's national rankings two seasons ago.

They have won 41 consecutive games and 65 of their last 66.

This season, Don Bosco is again ranked No. 1 in several national polls, extending its record under Toal to a staggering 136-10 with Friday's 63-15 victory over Passaic Tech.

"The bottom line is that all kids want to be successful," said Toal, who credits Pete LaBarbiera, his high school coach at Hasbrouck Heights, as his greatest coaching influence. "You want to put them in situations to be successful. You definitely don't want to confuse them. I think a confused player is not a very good player, so we definitely try to keep things somewhat simple."

There is extraordinary talent on the Don Bosco roster, yet those players believe the secret to their success lies in Toal's simplicity.

His grueling practices are legendary in North Jersey, trumped only by the content and fiery delivery of his emotional locker room speeches.

Former Hackensack All-American linebacker Vernon Rollins remembers being left wanting more when College Football Hall of Fame coach Hayden Fry finished his pregame rallying cry at the University of Iowa with – compared to everything he had heard from Toal – a whimper.

"We won a lot of games with Coach Toal, but if we didn't get it right [in practice], we were out there until it got dark," said Rollins, who now lives in Iowa. "And then he'd go turn on the lights. We had to get it right."

Critics insist Don Bosco wins because it can draw students – and, in turn, athletes – from anywhere in New Jersey, New York and beyond.

Toal's record at three previous public school stops should not be discounted: 127-26-2 and seven state sectional titles at Saddle Brook, River Dell and Hackensack.

"I don't think you can ever worry about what other people think. You worry about that, you'll drive yourself crazy," Toal said. "I think the most important thing is you owe it to your kids and the team that you worry about your own kids, your own team."

Brian McAleer was hired as Don Bosco's director of admissions months after Toal became head coach and stayed in that capacity until two years ago when he was named athletic director.

Don Bosco's enrollment has jumped by 200 students since 1999 and McAleer believes Toal and the Ironmen have played a significant role in that increase.

"The reality of it now is that — and people are going to look at this article and say, 'I can't believe this guy's saying this' — but we don't have to go and recruit," McAleer said. "Kids want to see us play Mission Viejo. Kids want to see us play De La Salle. They want to see us play St. Ed's. They want to see how we go against Bergen Catholic and St. Joe's. They come up here to watch us play and then, in my opinion, that's the best recruiting tool that's out there."

Toal never wonders what his legacy would be had Talamo never picked up the phone.

The North Jersey landscape likely would not have been dismantled by widespread league realignment as a solution to competitive imbalance, considering a good majority of that was generated by the gap between Don Bosco football and everybody else.

If not for the 11th-hour pleas of a priest, high school football around here would be plenty different than it is today.

"I expected [Toal] to say no," Talamo said. "But when I asked him to be our coach, his answer was these exact words: 'Let's do this,' and I'll never forget it. I kept my promise and he kept his. And his promise was to build Don Bosco a football program."

Toal has again built something special by turning Don Bosco into the one to beat as Talamo once prayed he would, completely changing the game around here in the process.

Led by coach Greg Toal, Don Bosco a national power

RAMSEY – The Rev. John Talamo is responsible for making the call that has forever changed North Jersey high school football.

He was desperate to hire a head coach who could alter the image of his football program.

In doing months of research, Talamo sought input from players and their parents, students and teachers and yes, even the school's mailman.

The consensus answer to one question — Who is the best football coach in New Jersey? – ended up selling Talamo without a résumé crossing his desk.

So one March night nearly 13 years ago, the former principal of Don Bosco opened the phone book and began dialing a man he had never met.

Talamo was unaware Greg Toal was set to become Clifton's coach the following day.

"I told him that I was looking for a football coach and when I told him what school it was, he started laughing," recalled Talamo, now the pastor of Our Lady of the Lake parish in Louisiana. "I said, 'Well, hold on, Coach, give me a chance. Look, I understand the situation here' … and he said, 'Let me tell you about the situation there. I wouldn't take my kids on that field and risk getting them hurt because of the playing conditions there.' "

Undeterred, at the end of that 10-minute conversation, Talamo pressed Toal for a face-to-face meeting to continue their discussion about the possibility.

"He told me, 'To be honest Father, I'm supposed to sign with Clifton,' " added Talamo, whose reassignment by the Salesians led to his departure from Don Bosco in 2002. '[But] because you called me and because you're a priest, I'll give you that respect.'

"When we hung up the phone, I prayed things would work out for the best."

Talamo and Toal toured the Don Bosco campus the next night.

While Toal kicked rocks that littered the football field, providing a comprehensive list of everything he believed Don Bosco was not doing, Talamo spoke of having his football team as the crown jewel of an athletic and academic powerhouse.

Toal wanted to see from Don Bosco officials the same commitment he demanded from his players. Talamo promised loyalty in making some of the changes Toal believed were necessary for the Ironmen to take their program to another level.

Two hours of spirited back-and-forth later, Talamo registered the biggest victory of his Don Bosco tenure when Toal agreed to become the next head coach of the Ironmen.

The rebuilding began shortly thereafter when Talamo brought in a landscape architect to redesign Granatell Stadium – Don Bosco's home field – from the ground up.

"Father John really did convince me this was the challenge worth taking," said Toal, 58. "We hoped to be good and we were going to work hard … but we never really projected where we are now."

What Don Bosco has done to this point is more than either man imagined.

The Ironmen have reset the standard for gridiron success in the Northeast, becoming the first New Jersey team to finish No. 1 in USA Today's national rankings two seasons ago.

They have won 41 consecutive games and 65 of their last 66.

This season, Don Bosco is again ranked No. 1 in several national polls, extending its record under Toal to a staggering 136-10 with Friday's 63-15 victory over Passaic Tech.

"The bottom line is that all kids want to be successful," said Toal, who credits Pete LaBarbiera, his high school coach at Hasbrouck Heights, as his greatest coaching influence. "You want to put them in situations to be successful. You definitely don't want to confuse them. I think a confused player is not a very good player, so we definitely try to keep things somewhat simple."